Matt Gonzalez Quotes

• Running for office is important, and you don't really need more than to be right on the issues, and to be able to articulate what it is you believe. You don't need a certain background. You don't need to be a lawyer. You don't need to have some professional degree.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Running, Believe, Issues

  "All Hope is Local: Quit Whining and Run for Office" by Allison Kilkenny, www.huffingtonpost.com. December 2, 2008.

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• Already renewable energy advocates are noting that the 42 miles of above-ground right-of-way between Yosemite and the city could be fitted with enough solar panels to generate at least 40 megawatts per year - a proposal the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission has never seriously considered because they currently aren’t required to do so.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Years, Cities, San Francisco

  "Restore Hetch Hetchy Valley, Vote Yes! on Proposition F" by Matt Gonzalez, www.huffingtonpost.com. November 5, 2012.

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• I think when judges are in the position of authority, they really get bent out of shape when someone tells them they acted inappropriately.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Thinking, Judging, Shapes

  "Matt Gonzalez would govern from the left" by Rachel Gordon, www.sfgate.com. October 18, 2003.

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• I think that when we're talking about youth violence, we're talking about kids who don't have opportunities, so they're engaged in a certain degree of lawlessness, because we as a society have failed them.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Kids, Opportunity, Thinking

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• You don't have to be wealthy to run for mayor. I'm a Green Party candidate running for mayor and I'm being taken seriously.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Running, Party, Taken

  "Matt Gonzalez taking his run for mayor in stride / He wants to apply ethics to politics" by Julian Guthrie, www.sfgate.com. October 22, 2003.

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• As a young boy I won a few dollars in 1972 when Riva Ridge won the Kentucky Derby. I had overheard someone say he was going to win, and I guess that made an impression on me.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Winning, Boys, Kentucky

  "Catching up with {hellip} Matt Gonzalez". Interview with Kenneth Baker, www.sfgate.com. February 27, 2009.

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• At some point the rhetoric runs out, and we have to ask ourselves, 'Are we simply going to standby while somebody's rhetoric is good, but their actions are so lousy?' Are we going to stand up for that?

  Matt Gonzalez

  Running, Action, Rhetoric

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• I had tried painting, mostly to give myself a greater appreciation of the craft and to inform how I looked at paintings. That led to collaging some of the work I had done on paper, and I found myself mixing in found pieces as well.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Appreciation, Giving, Mixing

  "Catching up with {hellip} Matt Gonzalez". Interview with Kenneth Baker, www.sfgate.com. February 27, 2009.

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• I think a lot of politicians, rightfully so, understand that their political futures are tied to how many times people see their names in print. The press is so accustomed to politicians wanting those things, it's a surprise when somebody's like, 'Whatever, I'm not really worried about those things.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Thinking, Names, People

  "Forever the rebel with a cause, Gonzalez exits left at City Hall / Idealist energized young liberals in strong run for mayor" by Suzanne Herel, www.sfgate.com. January 3, 2005.

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• I've run for office, and I've stood on street corners, while people walked by me and didn't want to talk to me, and did not think I was a credible candidate. And then four years later, I was nearly elected mayor of San Francisco, so I know what it takes.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Running, Thinking, San Francisco

  "All Hope is Local: Quit Whining and Run for Office" by Allison Kilkenny, www.huffingtonpost.com. December 2, 2008.

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• If you run for mayor, people say you're being egotistical. If you decide you won't run for mayor, people say you're being self-centered and egotistical.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Running, Self, People

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• I represented many of these kids as they become young adults in the criminal justice system when I was a public defender. One way of reaching out is by the mind of experimentation.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Kids, Justice, Mind

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• If you engage people honestly, and you're willing to do the leg work, people will respond to that.

  Matt Gonzalez

  People, Legs, Honestly

  "All Hope is Local: Quit Whining and Run for Office" by Allison Kilkenny, www.huffingtonpost.com. December 2, 2008.

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• If you are doing well, your business will pay more in tax; if you're not doing well, you pay less.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Pay, Taxes, Wells

  "Matt Gonzalez taking his run for mayor in stride / He wants to apply ethics to politics" by Julian Guthrie, www.sfgate.com. October 22, 2003.

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• I really am disappointed when I run into people who are angry I'm leaving office.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Running, People, Office

  "Forever the rebel with a cause, Gonzalez exits left at City Hall / Idealist energized young liberals in strong run for mayor" by Suzanne Herel, www.sfgate.com. January 3, 2005.

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• As a society we're always so quick and able to spend money on lawyers for someone for incarceration, but we don't make the corresponding commitment to the preventative components of it.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Commitment, Able, Lawyer

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• Certainly other things we can do, we gotta promote after-school employment, give kids an opportunity, raising the minimum wage was part of that, we can't expect that young people are going to feel they can make a living out there for such low wages.

  Matt Gonzalez

  School, Kids, Opportunity

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• I don't think the schools are getting as much money as they should.

  Matt Gonzalez

  School, Thinking, Should

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• I have voted to make tough decisions in budgetary times, I've served on two recessionary budgets, my opponent has never served on any a budget committee where there was less money to spend than the year before.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Years, Two, Decision

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• When in some communities selling drugs is so lucrative that that's a pretty big enticement that we have to break down. Part of that is by making opportunities and paying decent wages.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Opportunity, Community, Drug

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• A fascinating challenge facing today's environmental movement is how to best approach the reversal of past decisions that altered once-pristine environmental spaces for the sake of urgent man-made needs.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Past, Men, Space

  "Restore Hetch Hetchy Valley, Vote Yes! on Proposition F" by Matt Gonzalez, www.huffingtonpost.com. November 5, 2012.

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• When I got into politics, it was a shock. People promise all sorts of things and then never deliver.

  Matt Gonzalez

  People, Promise, Shock

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• Some types of environmental restoration projects are well-known; restored wetlands, for instance, or coal mine reclamation projects. Recently though, larger dam removal projects have started, a number of them in Washington state.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Numbers, Environmental, Restoration

  "Restore Hetch Hetchy Valley, Vote Yes! on Proposition F" by Matt Gonzalez, www.huffingtonpost.com. November 5, 2012.

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• This idea that once you get into politics you are now signed up for lifelong duty being in elective office, makes a fundamental error - and that is believing that the only way you can hold progressive views and implement them is in elective office.

  Matt Gonzalez

  Believe, Errors, Views

  "Forever the rebel with a cause, Gonzalez exits left at City Hall / Idealist energized young liberals in strong run for mayor" by Suzanne Herel, www.sfgate.com. January 3, 2005.

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